Shakeup at Teva Pharmaceutical and other Global Updates

It is useful to spend some time with kids. Our New Year break included trading leg-warmers, sharing ice cream in winter, my wearing sparkling sunglasses reading "2014" which produced smiles from everyone who saw me in them (thanks Claude for your first ever bought gift to Nana), and concern about the global crisis over the Taiwanese rubber duckie. As reported on by the BBC, a 59-ft gas-filled replica of a popular bath toy was constructed in Keelung harbor for the New Year's festivities by a Dutch artist. But then it was attacked by other real birds and collapsed. Moreover this was the 3rd Taiwanese giant rubber duckie to collapse in 2013. Surely a dreadful omen, but of what? What luck that now in a new year and no longer surrounded by the peanut gallery, I can worry about civil wars in Africa, terrorism at Indian Ocean tourist sites, explosions in the Middle East. And kick myself for not following the advice of  Aquamarine Fund  manager Guy Spier (based in Switzerland) to buy  Fiat . Real issues rather than rubber duckies. It is much more pleasant to be a grandmother and focus on the kids but I would be bored if I didn't do something else most of the time. More follows for paid subscribers from Jordan, Israel, Ireland, Canada, Mongolia, and more. *We last week told readers (based on a  Globes Israel  report) that  Teva  was expected to name Erez Vigodman as its new CEO to replace Dr Jeremy Levin fired 18 months into his tenure after being expensively head-hunted. Dr Levin's nemesis was Teva Chairman Dr Phillip Frost, an American serial drug entrepreneur. Earlier this week  The Financial Times  reported that Israeli entrepreneur Benny Landa has called not only for naming Vigodman to head the company, but also for "shaking up" the TEVA board, believed by the pink newspaper to mean getting rid of Dr Frost. Separately, today  Bloomberg  reports that  Jazz Pharma  (of Ireland) is a likely target for takeover by, among others, Teva, the more so now that it has acquired  Gentium.  Turn-around artist Vigodman at  Makhteshim Agan,  a chemical firm, and later at Strauss (a food firm) was known for acquisitions. He also supported some excessive M&A policies when he sat on Teva's board before the Frost era, but he has no drug industry credentials. *Across the Allenby Bridge, Jordanian drug-maker  Hikma Pharmaceuticals , HKMPY, is up 11.4% after being upgraded this morning to buy from neutral by  UBS . HKMPY is quoted in Dubai but its main listing is in London as a GDR, on which our ADRs are based. * Bombardier Inc.  won a 38 $2.2 bn plane order for its Challenger business jets from an undisclosed customer on New Year's Eve which followed another deal for 10 jets worth $260 mn the day before, also from an undisclosed customer. However its contract for providing rolling stock for the London Underground was terminated for an unexplained reason, and of course its commuter jets are not selling very well. BDRAF is Canadian. * Ituran  hit a new high in trading today, despite having gone ex div. The Israeli maker of auto and truck tracking systems is being targeted by Israeli dissidents and its board was re-elected late last year with as many as 45.88% nay ( lo ) votes. ITRN. *In Hong Kong trading today,  Tencent Holdings  reached a new all-time high, HK$501.50.  TCFZF.PK  or HK: 0700 or (indirectly),  Naspers  (NPSNY) is one of our key overweights. * Nokia  won an injunction in Germany against  HTC  Android phones for patent violation over its Bluetooth and NFC transmission systems. It is similar to the rulings by US and British courts against HTC and one by a lower level German court backing NOK's intellectual property. However, China is worried that patent fees will be raised after the separation of Nokia's smartcom business lines to  Microsoft  later this quarter and hurt local companies, also including  Huawei Tech  and  ZTE . Analysts expect that even at current levels, Nokia patent licenses can reach over $1 bn in 2014 from Chinese manufacturers alone and perhaps as much as $4.5 bn globally. * Benchmark Capital  raised its estimates for  Covidien  and set a price target of $82, up c20%. It expects EPS this year of $3.98 on sales of $10.61 bn. The US venture fund already earlier rated COV a buy. * Mongolia Growth Group  issued 91,179 restricted stock awards as bonuses to senior Mongolian staffers. These will vest within 30 months and are intended to motivate the Mongols. MNGGF.
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